In Hong Kong, the newly and hastily implemented national security law has caused much controversy since June 2020. Different news platforms have presented the law differently, which may affect how the public understands the issue. Many have questioned whether it violates the principle of “one country, two systems” and gives the Chinese government excessive power over Hong Kong. This study thus draws on Bednarek’s (2006) parameter-based theory (core evaluative parameters: comprehensibility, emotivity and importance; peripheral evaluative parameter: evidentiality) in the context of media discourse to examine the evaluative language of two news articles from New York Times and People’s Daily reporting on the national security law in Hong Kong. Analysing evaluative language is relevant in the sense that it reveals the writer’s opinions, attitudes and ideas as to the issue being discussed. With the use of discourse analysis, this study examines the stances and attitudes of such news articles. Findings show that the news text from the New York Times leans towards a rather negative stance and shows doubt and worry over the law, while the one from People’s Daily holds an extremely positive stance with absolute confidence and looks forward to the future of Hong Kong under the protection of the law. Given these findings, this paper calls for future research on how reading newspapers with different political stances may likely affect people’s perceptions and opinions on such political events.

Keywords: evaluation in text, media discourse, news articles, national security la

As an English major more inclined to the Applied Linguistics stream, I wanted to relate my capstone project to everyday lives. Emphasised by many of the courses provided by our resourceful department, the importance of attention to detail laid the foundation for my project. The framework of evaluation language enabled me to probe into texts and spot any meaningful data. I chose to analyse news articles of the National Security Law because the law was a popular and somewhat controversial topic currently. It was interesting to see how different stances and attitudes might be suggested through analysing the language use. The capstone project was undoubtedly the most rewarding course of my undergraduate studies. This project serves to be an achievement of mine not only academically but also personally and having been nominated for the exemplary award is just the icing on the cake. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Professor Ron Darvin, for being so responsive whenever I had questions and consistently giving me immediate feedback over the completion of my project.